A Perseid Below
Earthlings typically watch meteor showers by looking up.But thisremarkable view, captured on August 13, 2011 by astronaut Ron Garan, caught a Perseid meteor by looking down.From Garan’sperspective onboard theInternational Space Stationorbiting at an altitude of about 380 kilometers,the Perseid meteors streak below,swept up dustleft from comet Swift-Tuttle heated to incandescence.The glowing comet dustgrains are traveling atabout 60 kilometers per second throughthe denser atmosphere around 100 kilometers above Earth’s surface.
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